Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Skin Again by bell hooks

Skin Again is a children's book by bell hooks, the well-known writer who focuses on the interconnectivity of race, gender, and class, and the system of oppression produced by them.

This book has a powerful message: that skin is just a covering, and you have to come inside and open your heart to really know someone. It does not make the mistake of advocating "colourblindness", as another author may have done in writing this story. It acknowledges that the colour of one's skin is part of that person, but not the whole.

The writing is very poetic. That's actually what brought my rating down. I'm not a big fan of poetry, because I often find it hard to understand. I like some poetry. But there were some parts in this book where I didn't entirely understand a sentence here and there, and I'm an adult. I assume I'm better at understanding poetry than the average child (at least I hope so). So it seems like kids might be confused at times.

The illustrations, by Chris Raschka, are really nice. They're very vivid, and different from what I usually see in kids' books.

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About Me

I enjoy dancing and reading. I love Star Trek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Charmed. I blog about genealogy and books (on two separate blogs). I'm a cyclist. I'm a computer scientist, with a minor in philosophy. Languages I hope to learn fluently include French, German, American Sign Language, and Esperanto.